Mrs. Stiles on the witness-stand was a very different person, apparently, from Mrs. Stiles in an every-day situation. It may have been the effect of the crowd or the effect on her system of her long and painful illness, but she was agitated and nervous to the last degree. She looked steadily at Mrs. Tarbell, except when, every now and then, she looked uneasily about the room, and she gave her answers in so low a voice that the judge two or three times asked her to repeat them. But otherwise all went well enough. Mrs. Stiles knew who she was, where she lived, and what she had been doing on the day of the accident. When the critical moment came, Mrs. Tarbell caught her breath, but Mrs. Stiles avoided the difficulty in safety.
"I held up my umbereller for that there car to stop," she said; "and it stopped. And I went to git on; and then the first thing I knew I was falling."
This was highly satisfactory. For the rest, Mrs. Stiles described the manner in which the doctors had vainly endeavored to cure her injured ankle, told how she had passed sleepless night after night in spite of the morphia and sweet spirits of nitre, how she had been confined to her bed for three weeks and had only got up to be moved to a chair, how she suffered tortures and lost her appetite, how it was months before she could walk without crutches, and how every step she took gave her the most excruciating agony, and so forth, and so forth. She also, at Mrs. Tarbell's request, gave to the jury several interesting details concerning, first, her sewing-machine; second, the income she had been used to make by it; third, the effect of the accident upon her power to propel the aforesaid engine.
(Bill shown to witness.)
"This is my doctor—Dr. Laycock's bill: it is not paid yet."
(Offered in evidence. Another bill shown to witness.)
"This is the apothecary's bill. It has not been paid."
(Offered in evidence.)
"Cross-examine," said Mrs. Tarbell; and Mrs. Stiles slowly turned and began to hobble away from the witness-stand.
"Mrs. Stiles!" cried Mrs. Tarbell; and Mrs. Stiles turned round aghast.